#NewBeginnings _ #RekindledLove : The Wait

I have never been happier in my life. I am discovering new things about my husband that I had never seen before. I am discovering things about myself that I was never aware of. We have prospered and multiplied in every area of our lives – Except one. Sometimes I feel that with just how much God has blessed us, there is no reason to even bother him with this one request. My husband loves me unequivocally. He is a wealthy man and could very easily have chosen to marry another wife to birth an heir for him. But he completely refuses to even think about that as an option.

Those are the good days. On the bad days, I am barely able to look him in the eye. I feel inadequate. I feel like a disappointment. I feel oppressed. I feel useless. I feel like I will never be a real woman. What woman cannot do what nature required and equipped her to do? On those days, I chose to seclude myself in the tent from everyone, including him. My only living companion on those days is Hagar. We have settled into a peaceful, mature friendship. She respects me and loves me – as much as a slave can love her mistress – and on those days she is our link of communication. Abraham is no longer so hostile towards her although his aloofness has never disappeared.

*****

I would do anything to make this woman happy. I have tried everything I know to give her her deepest desire. The more I try the more I am certain that God is an independent, free thinking God. Not like the gods I have seen over my lifetime who either endlessly remain silent or do the extreme opposite and answer to the beck and call of their callers. Sometimes, looking around at the various strange new cultures we continue to experience season after season, I am amazed at how free spirited my God is. He does what He will, when He will, how He will, if He will. I have prayed to Him for years now. Endless seasons of festivals and rituals as were handed down by my ancestors on how to approach my God and how to fellowship and commune with him. And still nothing. I am fast approaching my centennial birthday and still we have no children. I look at my wife and see the pain every time she has to deliver a child or carry a child or comfort a child, or bury a child. Her heart breaks a new each time. Why won’t God answer me? She has started rambling again of late. I do not like the rambling phases. She talks a lot about an alternative and about a reasonable answer. I will pay her no mind. We fight again. I leave again.

*****

I am not a real woman. What kind of a woman cannot birth a child? What kind of a woman cannot even hold a pregnancy to term? What kind of a woman sits there knowing that her insides have cobwebs and that she will never have a child? I don’t know how he keeps looking at me. I don’t know why he continues to try intimacy with me. It will never amount to anything. I am nothing compared to the Hebrew women. Nothing compared to those who went before me and undoubtedly those who will come ahead. I was called to deliver another baby today. My heart literally broke into a million little pieces. I don’t even believe I have a heart anymore. Not with the number of times it has broken into a million little pieces; What cruel fate. All the midwives are unwell. Some have died. We don’t know of what. I am the only one who can do it so do it I must. But it breaks me every time. I marvel at the wonder that is the female anatomy. How it can bend and fold to accommodate another human being, and then how it once again bends and breaks to bring forth this life. When I hold these babies, it’s like my womb is on fire. When I hear them cry, it’s like my chest will explode. I am so tired of waiting. And waiting and waiting. Of being looked at and talked about and pitied. I am so tired of this God – who seems hot and bothered one day then cold and indifferent the next. I am tired of being whispered about. I am tired of people (male, female, young, old Hebrew, foreigner imposing their ideas and advise on me as though they were my doctor. Hello World: My Uterus Is None Of Your Business! Most of all I am tired of my wonderful husband seeing me as nothing but a receptacle; a conduit, a vessel. I lash out at him and speak unthinkable things to him. I already regret it but for now, just for now, I will hide behind the curtain of ” Your’e a man. You’ll never understand.”

*****

She is so angry. Perhaps at me? She says things that wound. They maim the soul. But I will love her still. I left her once and almost lost her. I will not lose her again. I will not allow the darkness to take her. She needs some space. And I need to confront this God. Today, we meet, mano-a-mano or a Dios.

*****

He’s off to his favorite mountain. He’s off to spend time with his God. I hope it helps. I think he wants to leave me. I can’t help what I say when the moods overcome me. I can’t help how I feel when I see the scarlet thread appear month in, month out. I can’t help who I am when I think – perhaps secretly – definitely never to be said out loud – that if he hadn’t given me away, then we would not have sinned against God. And He would not be punishing us.

*****

I SEE HIM CRYING OUT TO ME. I HEAR HER TURNING AWAY FROM ME. WHEN WILL THEY LEARN TO TRUST ME? EVERY TURN UNTIL NOW HAS LED THEM TO EXACTLY WHERE I NEED THEM. EVEN WHEN THEY DID NOT OBEY AND IN THIER EYES AND THOSE OF OTHER MEN THEY FAILED, THEY STILL ENDED UP EXACTLY WHERE I WANTED THEM. MY HEART BREAKS FOR THEM. THEY LOVE EACH OTHER SO MUCH. IF ONLY THEY COULD LOVE ME THAT WAY. EVEN WITHOUT SEEING ME. IF ONLY THEY WOULD COME TO ME INSTEAD OF TURNING TO ONE ANOTHER OR TO OTHER PEOPLE. I WILL WAIT. I AM SO COMPLETELY IN LOVE WITH THEM THAT I WILL WAIT. BECAUSE ONE DAY SOON, THEY WILL SEE EXACTLY WHAT I WAS DOING. UNTIL THEN, I WILL TURN A BLIND EAR TO SOME OF THIER PRAYERS, PLEAS AND DECREES. BECAUSE OF HOW MUCH I LOVE THEM. SO FOR NOW I SEND PEACE.